Last month, ABC announced that they would be offering streaming full episodes of four of its most popular shows as part of its two-month trial. The trial began on Monday, May 1, and will offer users streaming episodes of Desperate Housewives, Lost, Alias, and Commander-In-Chief.
This move comes in the face of the recent rapid growth in online video audiences who have made sites such as YouTube popular hits. ABC is spearheading efforts to test the waters of the broadband streaming video realm and what its possibility of big success is. The other big networks have similar offerings, though not with full streaming episodes offered for free. For example, NBC has a videos section that allows viewers to see a handful of popular viral-oriented clips from its popular comedy shows.
Each of ABCs four shows being offered online will be available in streaming form about 12 hours after they air on the East Coast. Alan Ives, VP of interactive sales for ABC, said that ABC might actually lose money on the trial run of the program if it becomes a huge success. ABC only charged advertisers for the costs associated with setting up the online player, which runs with Flash technology and works on Firefox.
Finding advertisers was easy for ABC, who garnered the attention of the likes of AT&T, Cingular, Toyota, Ford, Procter & Gamble, Unilever, GE’s Universal Pictures, and Walt Disney Pictures, after it had revealed its plans for the service last month.
Each online episode begins with a 10-second spot from the advertiser sponsoring the episode, after which there are three commercial breaks. Each of these three breaks features either a video or clickable ad. These will stay on the screen for at least 30 seconds, after which the viewer has the option of either continuing with the current ad or resuming the episode they are watching.
Compared to the standard five commercial breaks during television broadcasts of these shows, users should find three 30-second ads quite easy to stomach. The pop-up player is sleek and simple, and allows the user to adjust the volume and enlarge the viewing screen.
ABC has an existing relationship with Apple, who sells its shows for download onto iPods. Users who would have purchased episodes through Apple may very well be drawn away from this option and lured to view the episodes of these four major shows online during this trial period.
ABCs affiliates will also be hurt during this trial period. Viewers now have an option to fall back on, if they are unable to see their favorite show at its normal time slot. This gives them less incentive to make time for Lost on Wednesday nights since they know they can just watch the episode 12 hours later and with less commercials getting in their way. Disney-ABC Television Group President Anne Sweeney said that the company would work with their network affiliates to build an online business model.
After the end of June, ABC will end the trial period and will review the results of the run for possible use at the start of the fall season. Though Sweeney has indicated that the network would introduce an improved version of the program later this year, the success of the offering will depend on the responses of online viewers.
The success of the program and the positive response to the online episode offerings by the general public seem to be almost guaranteed, but this does not mean that television as we know it is going to change. ABC said that they do not expect these online ads to come close to replacing their television advertising revenue stream, which is a strong enough reason for maintaining most of its focus on the traditional delivery of its episodes and ads on TV.
Sources:
http://www.mickeynews.com/News/Display
PressRelease.asp_Q_id_E_4286Ads
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/
20060501-6711.html
http://dynamic.abc.go.com/streaming/landing
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